Monday, November 12, 2007

The actress Laraine Day died on Saturday. I knew who she was because I’m a Hitchcock fan and I’ve seen Foreign Correspondent a few times, but I didn’t know this:

. . . “She became known as “the first lady of baseball” and accompanied Durocher and the Giants to Cuba for spring training. She traveled with the team during the regular season and in 1952 wrote “Day With the Giants,” which the New York Herald Tribune called “an amusing, informative book, the first to report on baseball from the viewpoint of the wife.” Although they divorced in 1960, the couple remained friends until Durocher’s death in 1991. When he was posthumously inducted into the baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, N.Y., it was Day who was chosen from his four wives to attend.”

It’s October 3, 1954. You’re the manager of the New York Giants. With the help of a young Willie Mays patrolling center, you’ve just swept a 111-win team to win the World Series and you’re boarding the morning train back to New York. In addition the the victory banquets and plaudits from the greatest city in the world, you’ve got a smokin’ Hollywood actress who loves to talk about baseball waiting for you at home.

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I've really liked your work, Craig. But that being said, in the spirit of an admired baseball man and an intelligent, talented woman allow me to say that your headline is juvenile and rather disrespectful.

You're not wrong Lassus. Apologies for the juvenailia. I wrote it rather quickly early this morning and didn't think all that much before doing so. If it makes any difference (and I doubt it does, but still) the thing that caused me to giggle as I wrote it was the juxtipostion of the playa language against an ancient Leo Durocher (who will always look like his 1971 baseball card in my mind), not an intent to objectify Laraine Day.

er ... i don't want to get into this fight, but knowing what has been written about durocher, and having read his autobiography, that headline is about how he would have put it too.
he had a rotten childhood that resulted in him being a pretty coarse, selfish, ethically challenged guy who always made himself out to be the victim when people called him out.
he was traded from the yankees back in the 20s because it was rumored he stole some things from a teammate's locker, among other things.
and the whole business of him marrying laraine day was pretty sleazy too. he basically stole her from the guy she was married to at the time.
his version of it in 'nice guys finish last' smells to heaven. i felt like i needed to take a shower after reading that book.

but on the plus side:
-he stood up to the dodger players who didn't want jackie robinson on the team because he knew robinson was a star player and would help the team win, which was all durocher cared about. unfortunately, before robinson could play for him he was suspended for the 1947 season by the commissioner for consorting with gamblers.
-he was the manager of the giants when willie mays came up and he treated him like a son. again, it was all about bringing along a talented player who could win games. but still, he knew what the situation needed.

I've really liked your work, Craig. But that being said, in the spirit of an admired baseball man and an intelligent, talented woman allow me to say that your headline is juvenile and rather disrespectful.

mccoy, don't be obtuse. i never said she was covered in glory. he inserted himself in that marriage when he had no business doing that. he was still doing something he shouldn't have done.

Nonsense. Unless you are claiming Leo broke down the door, raped Ms. Day and carried her off, then what he did is what every human being does which is find a companion. And obviously the two "worked", they stayed together for over a decade and were friends even after their marriage ended. Ms. Day was married and she was the one in control of the Leo-Day relationship. She could have said no and if she was truly happy with Mr. Hendricks she would have said no and nothing would have happened.

This whole someone is married so they are off limits thing is nonsense. People are not property to be bought and owned. Just because you marry someone that doesn't mean you no longer have to work at the relationship. Marriage is simply another level of a relationship and all relationships can end. The "sacred vows" of marriage were not Leo's vows. He didn't promise to be faithful to Mr. Hendricks, Ms. Day did. If anybody is in the wrong it certainly isn't Leo, it is Ms. Day.

I read somewhere that Leo's advice on picking up women was that within the first five minutes of meeting them, you should put your hand on her thigh. If she tells you to buzz off, that's something you want to know sooner rather than later anyway. And if she doesn't tell you to buzz off, hey, you're on your way.

Leo and Laraine Day and Willie Mays were on this famous SI cover back in 1955, and it cost SI a bunch of canceled subscriptions and a lot of hate mail. That arm of hers on Willie's shoulder was tantamount to rape in the eyes of a lot of 1950's Southerners.

I definitely remember reading something -- dunno if it was a Bill James work, or The Boys of Summer, or what the heck it was -- where Leo gave his dating advice, which was this. Ask the woman out on a date at 7 PM... then "put your hand on her snatch" (phrased just like that) at 7:10. If she knocks your hand off, you have time to find another date for that night; if she doesn't, then you know the night will be worthwhile.

In between that sort of thing, the stolen watch and wife, and various other peccadillos, well, this was just a shady type of guy. I'm not going to get any deeper into analyzing the morality of the marriage covenant; that's not my problem. I do agree that <u>Nice Guys Finish Last</u>, despite being a fantastically readable piece of advocacy journalism by the all-time great ghostwriter Ed Linn, just seemed like complete BS from start to finish. I'll also point out that Durocher's "Mista Leo! Mista Leo!" characterization of Mays, at least read a few decades later, seems very belittling.

All that said, he was a good manager. Not really the type I'd want managing my team, and certainly not one whose style would fly in the modern game in any event -- hell, it wasn't flying when he was still trying to manage in the late '60s and early '70s. But a good one at his best, in the Billy Martin mold -- hell, he made the Billy Martin mold. And the one-year suspension did seem unfair; I will give him and his book that.

he was traded from the yankees back in the 20s because it was rumored he stole some things from a teammate's locker, among other things.

The story I heard ( I think it was Elden Auker telling it)was that Durocher was rooming with Babe Ruth (no one else would) and Babe caught him stealing 100's from his wallet. Babe nearly beat him to death in a hotel in Detroit before the staff separated them.

The Yankees immediately ditched Durocher, and he was unofficially bannned from the AL for life.

I found a copy of "Nice Guys Finish Last" when I was 12 or 13, and it was the first baseball book I ever read. It's like a baseball Forrest Gump -- Durocher was there in the mix with some of the greatest players and moments in the game's history. Dizzy Dean going in to pinch-run and taking a pivot throw right between the eyes. Babe Ruth dangling Miller Huggins out the window of a moving train. Dusty Rhodes' improbable WS heroics. Willie's debut, of course, and a lot more I'm forgetting or blurrily remembering (it's been, ummm, almost 30 years). I was too young to see it for the "advocacy journalism" the DA correctly calls it, but it's a great read and hooked me on baseball history and the game in general. Find a copy if you haven't already.

mccoy, wake up. again, this isn't about whether or not laraine day did something wrong in your quaint bourgeois formulation, it's about what a slimeball leo durocher could be. let me put it this way: if you had a girlfriend, would you want to bring her to a party that leo was attending? or leave him in a room alone with her so he could test his hand-on-the-snatch theory? oh sure, i can hear it: you'd have no problem because you know your girlfriend is not like that, or she can handle herself or whatever. or maybe you'd do it so you can see if you were right all along, she's just another fallen woman and unworthy of your love! skip it.

That arm of hers on Willie's shoulder was tantamount to rape in the eyes of a lot of 1950's Southerners.

Sweet, the South gets all the credit again. Not saying Southerners were happy about it, but I am sure Sports Illustrated got plenty of pissed off people from every part of the country.

I know this, but (a) the letters they printed were from the South, and (b) it wasn't the North that had all those anti-miscegenation laws on their books up until the Supreme Court threw them out. There were plenty of neighborhoods in the North where Mays would've been wise to stay away from if he weren't so easily recognizable, but back then only the South could get so worked up over a picture on a magazine cover.

This whole someone is married so they are off limits thing is nonsense.

I wonder how your wife would feel about that sentiment. "Sure, honey, I slept with someone at I picked up at a bar -- but just because we're married doesn't mean I'm off limits."

Also, be sure to tell your co-workers that their wives aren't off limits to you, because after all, you didn't enter into an agreement with anybody.

People are not property to be bought and owned.

No; they're people in a contractual relationship. It's both morally and legally wrong to try to get one party to a contract to breach a contract.

Just because you marry someone that doesn't mean you no longer have to work at the relationship. Marriage is simply another level of a relationship and all relationships can end. The "sacred vows" of marriage were not Leo's vows. He didn't promise to be faithful to Mr. Hendricks, Ms. Day did. If anybody is in the wrong it certainly isn't Leo, it is Ms. Day.

I don't know the details, but if the relationship was already over, he didn't do anything wrong. If it wasn't -- as I assume it wasn't from the claim that he "stole" her -- then in addition to legal obligations, there's a basic social obligation not to act like an #######.

It's both morally and legally wrong to try to get one party to a contract to breach a contract.

Well, there is the concept of efficient breach . . .

That aside, you raise an interesting point. At one time -- and I'm presuming 1947 was that time -- there was an analog to tortious interference claims as they related to the marriage contract. In Ohio (and I guess elsewhere) they were called criminal conversation laws in which, to use this example, Day's ex-husband could sue Durocher for, essentially, seducing his wife and receive money damages in exchange. Never mind what she thought of it all because the presumption was that any woman who would leave her man had to have been tricked or powerless to stop it or whatever. Maybe it was a rebutable presumption. I have no idea.

Anyway, these laws are all (or should be all) off the books by now, and I'm guessing they were little-used even at the time. Still, it's interesting to think about such laws when we evaluate Leo's conduct. I mean, at the time, he was considered to have been engaging in tortious activity, akin to assault or conversion or something. Maybe that changes things on some philopsophical level.

Well, for some of you it might. My personal view is that It's up to people in a marriage to behave themselves. Leo may have been a jackass, but if Day fell for him, who are we to blame him for tryin'?

(b) it wasn't the North that had all those anti-miscegenation laws on their books up until the Supreme Court threw them out.

Well, they were more prevalent in the South, but they weren't unique to the South by any means, Andy. There's a little bit of slipperiness in your claim there. By 1967 when <u>Loving</u> was decided, it was basically the former slave states (the Confederacy, plus the loyal slave states, plus Oklahoma and West Virginia.) But the topic was a magazine cover in 1955, not 1967, and in 1955, there were plenty of western and mountain states that still had such laws.

And of course, we're only talking about laws on the books, not social rules which were enforced informally; those were obviously far more widespread.

I don't fully disagree with you guys to the point of McCoy, but when you live life, it just seems like everything is a different case. My dad cheated on my mom, even though they there wasn't a visible problem prior (abuse, or even fighting). They split up, and at the time my mother was miserable. Soon after, however, she remarried to a MUCH more compatible man, as the woman was for my father. Is the woman who lured my father away from my mom to be blamed for.... everyone being much happier? Where's the wrong?

It's just never simply enough to get down on one of the parties involved for a situation about which none of us know anything, I guess. Which means, pretty much, any situation we aren't actually involved with. So to point and say "wrongdoing" doesn't cut it for me.

DAMNNNNN I was so going to guess in the earlier post Maryland as the "nothern" state that would have still had said laws that late. I consistently kid my friends who are from there about Maryland actually being the south. They always deny it.

sometimes you have to make your decision based on what's in front of you. a bad decision that turns out good is still a bad decision.
if you are late for work and you decide to heck with it, if i hit the gas and run every red light going forward, i'll make it, and you do it, and somehow you never encounter a pedestrian or a car going through an intersection, was that a good decision? it's still reckless.
your mom and dad were lucky. that's a whole 'nother story.

I consistently kid my friends from there about Maryland actually being the south. They always deny it.

I'm from Maryland and while I like to tease my wife about her side losing the Civil War (she was born in Richmond), I have to admit that Maryland is the south - especially the part where I grew up (Eastern Shore). Heck, the Mason-Dixon line is the Pennsylvania-Maryland border.

Is the woman who lured my father away from my mom to be blamed for.... everyone being much happier? Where's the wrong?

I don't think it is always about everyone being happy. Happiness isn't guaranteed so there is no way knowing who is going to be happy in the end. Sometime sticking things out leaves everyone happy and stronger.*

Happiness isn't guaranteed so there is no way knowing who is going to be happy in the end. Sometime sticking things out leaves everyone happy and stronger.

Sometimes. And sometimes not (which does appear to be your overall point, I admit). I sure wish my folks had split years sooner than they did--would have spared them years of unhappiness and me the feeling of dread on entering the house for most of my mid-to-late teen years.

phred - Not everyone who leaves their spouse does so for a good reason, but I also doubt that a majority of those who do are making a bad decision. My point being that to simply judge out of hand is a mistake remains, and your metaphor, ehhhhhhh. My parents got lucky, yes, as does everyone who ends up happy. But they did not get lucky because their decisions were bad by default and luck was the only way they would then be allowed happiness ].

(b) it wasn't the North that had all those anti-miscegenation laws on their books up until the Supreme Court threw them out.

Well, they were more prevalent in the South,

I should have just left it at that, I suppose. Too much reliance on hunch and memory doesn't always work.

but they weren't unique to the South by any means, Andy. There's a little bit of slipperiness in your claim there. By 1967 when Loving was decided, it was basically the former slave states (the Confederacy, plus the loyal slave states, plus Oklahoma and West Virginia.) But the topic was a magazine cover in 1955, not 1967, and in 1955, there were plenty of western and mountain states that still had such laws.

I just went down and checked Pauli Murray's 1950 book on States' Laws on Race and Color, which BTW is a great reference work for the immediate postwar era. And while the anti-miscegenation laws were being repealed rather rapidly in the North and West in the 1950's, at the beginning of that decade there were 30 states (out of 48) that barred whites from marrying either blacks or mulattoes:

I was somewhat surprised not to see D.C. on that list, even though Murray did note Washington's other Jim Crow restrictions, mainly WRT schools and playgrounds.

And of course, we're only talking about laws on the books, not social rules which were enforced informally; those were obviously far more widespread.

That's a bit more complicated. The biggest difference between the South (and by that I meant the Old Confederacy plus the Border States) and the West is that for the most part the laws in the West were more a barrier to mixed couples actually getting licensed in those states than it was against them actually living in those states, at least in many areas.

And again, the violent reactions to "race mixing" were far more in the South than anywhere else, especially after WWII.

None of this is to claim that the North was any sort of mecca of racial tolerance. You only have to google "Detroit + 1943" or "Cicero + 1951" to disabuse yourself of that comfortable notion. But it wasn't by any means only economic opportunity that drove so many blacks out of the South in the Jim Crow era. And even that "economic opportunity" difference between North and South was driven to a great extent by racism of the crudest type. Anybody who lived through this period without rose colored glasses could attest to that, including many prominent Southerners who testified and worked to change it.

And for the record, the three letters that SI printed in protest of that Mays cover were from Nashville, Fort Worth and New Orleans. The only one that praised it was from Cleveland. Small sample size, of course, but fairly representative of the relative buzz you heard from the various regions.

He's not talking about one spouse leaving another. He's talking of the specific act of getting involved with another person while you (or that other person) is married. That is, in our view, wrong. How wrong depends on the situation, and may in fact be the lesser evil in some situations. It also may lead to better things, as your dad's infidelity apparently did. But it's still, at heart, wrong.

SoSH - that makes total sense, and I'm against infidelity as a concept. Hell, you should hear me rail on about how poly relationships are a load of crap.

I think to discount the results of decisions that are made is just ridiculous, however. It's not a concept in the cases where humans are involved - being, EVERY case, not just mine. I was there - everyone's way better off because my dad committed his infidelity. You can talk theory all you want, but theory does not apply in specific cases - in this case it was a GOOD decision. That's what I'm arguing here.

Leo and Laraine Day and Willie Mays were on this famous SI cover back in 1955, and it cost SI a bunch of canceled subscriptions and a lot of hate mail. That arm of hers on Willie's shoulder was tantamount to rape in the eyes of a lot of 1950's Southerners.

The cover date is April 11, 1955; Sports Illustrated was founded the previous summer. Did this make Laraine Day the first woman to appear on an SI cover? (Of course, if later editorial policies had already been instituted, we would have seen Laraine Day in a swimsuit.)

The cover date is April 11, 1955; Sports Illustrated was founded the previous summer. Did this make Laraine Day the first woman to appear on an SI cover? (Of course, if later editorial policies had already been instituted, we would have seen Laraine Day in a swimsuit.)

Of course most of these were society dames all decked out for the grouse shooting season, but never mind that. There were plenty of others, too---certainly more women in general than baseball or football or basketball players. The biggest single cover subject then was animals.

thanks sosh for jumping in and speaking for me while i was actually doing work instead of hanging around this thread, which act of course raises all sorts of ethical problems about stealing time from your employer.
anyway.
lassus, what sosh said is very much to my point, and the thread is getting too mired in legality vs. morality. all i've ever done is address the underlying lack of ethics in the case of durocher and day. there's simply no doubt whatsoever that the kind of thing leo was doing was immoral; what we, or you, or laraine day or anybody does about that is wholly other. i wasn't advocating anybody being arrested or anything for it. the most i'd say is that all the principals would have to live with their actions. you may think in your highly anecdotal personal case that it's fine, no harm, etc. and you may be right. but it still doesn't relieve the burden of transgression from the initial act of a person trying to essentially bust up a marriage. hindsight, results, so what? one could easily posit that if your parents had hung on, and talked to each other, really talked to each other, they could have found a way to go forward in their relationship. and even you, as close as you are to that particular event, cannot categorically say that it might not have worked. so it makes your argument insubstantial. its rationalizing. go back to what i said about the commuter who runs the red lights and try to take that thinking to all the other moral quandaries in front of us. you really think it's a weak analogy? try closing your eyes to everyone around you and running a red light sometime and you'd see how serious that kind of behavior is.

mccoy, wake up. again, this isn't about whether or not laraine day did something wrong in your quaint bourgeois formulation, it's about what a slimeball leo durocher could be. let me put it this way: if you had a girlfriend, would you want to bring her to a party that leo was attending? or leave him in a room alone with her so he could test his hand-on-the-snatch theory? oh sure, i can hear it: you'd have no problem because you know your girlfriend is not like that, or she can handle herself or whatever. or maybe you'd do it so you can see if you were right all along, she's just another fallen woman and unworthy of your love! skip it.

I'm wide awake. This is total BS. Leo is the slimeball because your girlfriend would rather go out with him then you? On top of that you got this territorial crap going on over a human being. Ihimm! You mine, you go stay, nmmm. Caveman crap.

phred - your thoughts are reasonable and thought out and expressed well, and I appreciate this. But again, this is the problem: you are making an overall judgment based on things of which you know nothing. This, especially:

"one could easily posit that if your parents had hung on, and talked to each other, really talked to each other, they could have found a way to go forward in their relationship. and even you, as close as you are to that particular event, cannot categorically say that it might not have worked. so it makes your argument insubstantial."

One who knew nothing about my parents could easily posit this. And could also posit your theorem to any couple and all couples who have broken up or had infidelities. It doesn't make it correct, and it CERTAINLY isn't correct in this instance. Tell me, phred, how many hours and days and weeks and months did my parents talk to try and fix the situation? So after all those months, you can say that my position is unsound? Based on what you know about the situation? They didn't extend the talking to years, to decades? You can say where they failed, and how? To make that assumption from your position is far more insubstantial than anything I said. And to apply it to any number of situations about which you are far removed is really troubling.

Infidelity is not morally sound. Absolutely not. One this we agree. But it is only one part of a much larger picture, and this is why I took your analogy to task. You cannot apply a black-and-white circumstance - RED or GREEN - to a situation involving humans, which is far more complicated than a traffic intersection; it diminishes a relationship to reduce it to such a comparison. That's the main thing. And also also, c'mon. There's a danger of true, physical danger and DEATH to you and others in running a red light. As much as I appreciate the loss of humanity's moral center, It is just not comparable. Allow me to quote Roselyn, from As You Like It: "Men have died from time to time and worms have eaten them, but not for love."

I wonder how your wife would feel about that sentiment. "Sure, honey, I slept with someone at I picked up at a bar -- but just because we're married doesn't mean I'm off limits."

I'd say she would be pissed and she should be pissed at me. but that isn't the point. For some oddball reason instead of being pissed with the person you are actually in a relationship with most people tend to take their anger out on the other person.

Also, be sure to tell your co-workers that their wives aren't off limits to you, because after all, you didn't enter into an agreement with anybody.

Well, here is that property thing again. She my wife, she belong to me. If I approach your wife and we go out on a date and we hit it off and we enter into a relationship I'm the bad guy? Why, because you lost your wife? Why did you lose your wife? Your wife chose not to be with you.

It's both morally and legally wrong to try to get one party to a contract to breach a contract.
So I guess divorce is a no no for you? I guess mom can't tell her daughter to divorce that good for nothing husband of hers because should we would be breaking the law and being morally wrong.

I agree with you about the moral issues, McCoy, but you seem to think that people who feel a thing called "jealousy", or who feel like they've been treated unfairly when they lose something, are abnormal and should stop feeling that way. That's not going to happen.

No I certainly understand jealousy. I certainly understand being upset that your wife/girlfriend cheated on you. What I don't agree with is this notion that Leo "stole" Day. As if she is property and belongs to Hendricks no matter what.

No I certainly understand jealousy. I certainly understand being upset that your wife/girlfriend cheated on you. What I don't agree with is this notion that Leo "stole" Day. As if she is property and belongs to Hendricks no matter what.

McCoy, you can probably drop the property argument, as you're the only one making it. Phredbird shouldn't have said stole, but he's pretty much laid out his case without even hinting that Ms. Day belonged to Mr. Hendricks.

In your very first post, you said it "takes two to tango." That is our point. The fact that the breakup of the Hendricks-Day relationship was ultimately the fault of Day does not mean Durocher's actions were above criticism. Day and Hendricks entered, as David put it, a contract. They made a mutual commitment. Aiding someone in the breach of that contract is wrong. It may not be the worst of wrongs, and I'd certainly agree that it isn't a wrong that should produce punitive action from the state, but it is wrong nonetheless.

If I approach your wife and we go out on a date and we hit it off and we enter into a relationship I'm the bad guy? Why, because you lost your wife?"

If you apporach someone else's wife, you are the bad guy. If someone else's wife approaches you, then the situation becomes more morally complex and abstract ethics don't really apply. But it's a fairly universal rule of society that you don't hit on someone who you know is in a monogamous relationship. It's not about ownership, and it's not implying that these wimmins need a man to tell them what they want. It's an asinine thing to do. If you hit on your friends' girlfriends, you'd better be prepared to lose those friends, get your asz kicked, or both.

if you are late for work and you decide to heck with it, if i hit the gas and run every red light going forward, i'll make it, and you do it, and somehow you never encounter a pedestrian or a car going through an intersection, was that a good decision? it's still reckless.
your mom and dad were lucky. that's a whole 'nother story.

What a terrible analogy. As if what happens to people in relationships is completely up to the fates, something they have no control over, like whether a pedestrian will be in the street a 1/4 mile down the road.

But it's a fairly universal rule of society that you don't hit on someone who you know is in a monogamous relationship.

And what if you do, and you end up marrying that person, and you end up together for 70 years with beautiful little grandchildren and are the model love story of the century? It was still wrong to approach her? It would have been better for the world if you never connected?

McCoy, you can probably drop the property argument, as you're the only one making it. Phredbird shouldn't have said stole, but he's pretty much laid out his case without even hinting that Ms. Day belonged to Mr. Hendricks.

No I am not the only one making that argument. Practically everybody saying that some woman is off limits becuase she belongs to them is making a property argument.

. But it's a fairly universal rule of society that you don't hit on someone who you know is in a monogamous relationship

And what if you do, and you end up marrying that person, and you end up together for 70 years with beautiful little grandchildren and are the model love story of the century? It was still wrong to approach her? It would have been better for the world if you never connected?

Yes. It had a nice ending, but it was still wrong. Obviously the level varies depending on the individual circumstances.

Take theft. Theft is, by default, wrong. How wrong can vary. It's probably a lot more defensible to take money from a kiddie porn peddler and give it to an orphanage than it is to take it from an orphanage to give it to the smut dealer. But the act itself is inherently wrong.

Now suppose you embezzle a little bit of money from your company (above the undetermined money we all steal by posting on company time). And you use that money to seed your fledging business enterprise that happens, down the road, to develop some life-saving technolgy that helps millions. A lot of good came from that theft, yet the theft itself was still wrong.

Durocher was a cheat and a thief throughout his baseball life ('51 pennant, anyone?), but would he have lived a better life if he'd had the foresight to adopt the ethics of better, more prosperous men?

As for right and wrong, what is the basis for that judgment? For me, moral judgments of other people are the root of true evil and wrongdoing in the world, the basis of more misery and oppression than all the infidel spouses on the planet.

It's not that infidelity isn't wrong, or murder or theft or other things that are agreed upon as wrongdoing, but many of those acts are driven by other acts of murder, theft and infidelity that are unacknowledged by those making the moral judgments.

Right now, our democratically elected government is killing and oppressing most of the people on this planet so that we may maintain the American Dream, the American Way of Life. We are as comfortable as we are because of this wrongdoing, and we're not going to stop of our own accord.

You can call that b.s., but my point is an anti-american screed, but that our morality is rooted in our own self-interest and social arrangements.

I disagree with phred, but I'm in complete agreement on one point -- you have to live with you actions.

Right now, I am faced with a choice of getting sexually involved with a married woman at work. There are two big reasons right there not to do it -- it could hurt me at work, her husband could find out and do me violence, if I fall in love with her I'm emotionally screwed. But if I decide the passionate intensity that the sparks already indicate will be the result of that union, I may decide to pay the potentially high price.

And what if you do, and you end up marrying that person, and you end up together for 70 years with beautiful little grandchildren and are the model love story of the century? It was still wrong to approach her?"

Yes. Good results can come from bad decisions. That doesn't make the original decision any better. The situation you're describing is one of the least likely results possible. Most couples that start with infidelity have ordinary relationships, not transcendent love stories. And anyone who tells you that they hooked up with their girfriend to make the world a better place is either lying or trying to score points with his girlfriend.

Except very obviously Ms. Day was not in an monogamous relationship."

I don't know the details of the Day-Hendricks-Durocher triangle, so I can't say what that relationship was like. I'm making a more general statement. I'm not sure I understand your point of view. McCoy, do you regularly hit on your friends' girlfriends? If not, why not?

anyone who tells you that they hooked up with their girfriend to make the world a better place..

Hooking up may not make the world a "better" place (moral judgment), but it without doubt makes the world. And I don't know about yours, but my world's almost always a better place when I'm hooking up.

Hindsight is always 20/20. But it's hard to drive with your eyes fastened on the rearview mirror.

I'm not sure I understand your point of view. McCoy, do you regularly hit on your friends' girlfriends? If not, why not?
Because they are my friends. I care about them and don't actively want to try and make them feel sad or bad. Just like I won't cheat on my girlfriend because I care about her and don't wish to make her feel sad or bad. Though to be perfectly honest I did hit on my old roommates girlfriend back in college. She was a smoking hot 18 year old former gymnast with great breasts and he was a stupid immature on his way to becoming an alcoholic past out all the time boyfriend. They were your typical out of high school sweethearts who spent half the time yelling and screaming at each other and the other half talking all lovey-dovey. Something probably would have happened but I graduated and never saw here again. A few years later I ran into a guy who was currently living with my old roommate and he told me the two of them broke up and he was into fat chicks now. Ticked me off that I never got anywhere with her. So if anybody knows Aimee from Cherry Hill tell her I said hey.

You can live a full life without damaging the lives of others. I'm not a fan of the "I'll live my life and the hell with the consequences" point of view. I'm not saying that describes you, but your post reads that way.

So it is okay to make strangers feel sad or bad, but not your friends? Because strangers aren't real people, so their feelings don't matter?

Ask the girlfriend/wife who just cheated on the stranger if his feelings matter.

Sorry, I can't spend my life worrying about the whole world as much as I do my family or friends. Should I buy 6 billion Christmas presents this year? I don't wish mankind any ill, but if some girl I want also wants to be with me, I'm supposed to refuse on account of some ####### I don't give a #### about who thinks he has a claim on her?

Hooking up may not make the world a "better" place (moral judgment), but it without doubt makes the world. And I don't know about yours, but my world's almost always a better place when I'm hooking up."

Greed makes the world. Murder makes the world. Lots of things make the world. "It makes the world" is not an argument. It's a way of ignoring the issue.

Edit: I can see we're not going to agree on this. I think I understand your points of view now, and we have no common ground. I'm glad I don't see the world the way you do. I'd guess the feeling's mutual.

Nobody knows what goes on in a relationship except for the two people in it. It's really that simple. Outsiders can moralize in the abstract all they want -- and they could be right in the abstract -- but they don't have sufficient information upon which to judge the acts of anyone in this situation.

There are certain things you just don't do: You don't tug on Superman's cape, you don't spit into the wind... and you don't do that. It has nothing to do with property, or how the other sex is viewed. If you can't see that, you are a hopeless sociopath.

IF the relationship is bad, IF the prospective partner will be happier with another, a decent human will wait for a formal separation. Only a scum sucking opportunist will jump the gun.

Would Leo Durocher have been better off behaving as a decent human being, never making the majors, never managing, certainly never winning the love of an actress or winning the '51 pennant, maybe the central moment in baseball history?

If you've never had to scratch and claw to get somewhere in life, it's probably because one of your ancestors did the scratching and clawing for you.

Bull. Hell you yourself just listed off reasons for one to get into the middle of a relationship. You've got a friend she tells you her boyfriend is a jerk, she isn't happy, she doesn't know what to do. You've liked her for sometime, she has always enjoyed your company. What are you supposed to do at this point? Are you supposed to protect the boyfriends "rights" and tell her stay in a relationship she isn't happy with? Do you say nothing and hope someday she figures it out herself (some friend), or do you say "You know Jenny I've been crazy about you for sometime and this relationship you are in right now isn't a good one. You are not happy, you haven't been for sometime. Why don't you and I go out"?

and here is yet another fascinating look into the minds hearts and balls of males

the one thing that has really shocked me the most about You People over these past 6 years i been coming here been learning how you feel about your wives/gf and about how so many of you are against adultery for both you and her.

alex,

just because you CAN do something doesn't mean you SHOULD. life is full of lines that we draw. not deliberately destroying other peoples lives and relationships for your own fun should be right at the top of the list

there is something important to be said for being a decent person because that actually is the most important "somewhere" that there is

and as for adultery you screw someone else, you break your relationship. and it is something you can't never really fix. sort of like gluing a plate back together. it might could look ok but it's not really. if you want to break up then you should do it the decent way and not the shtthead way

Again, I'm not suggesting you should because you can. I have not once in my nearly 42 years cheated on a girlfriend or a spouse, nor have I done it with another person's spouse. I worst I've done is sleep with an ex-girlfriend who hadn't officially broken up with the guy she was seeing but did afterwards.

In my experience, women are just as likely as men to get in extra-relationship relationships. Pretty obviously. And men are not in the driver's seat when it comes to most sexual relationships even if you let us think it. Women usually decide whether to pull the trigger, even if men are more willing to pull it.

In my instance, the woman has no intention of breaking up her marriage, nor do I. Her husband is significantly older than she is and she's not getting what she needs. Ultimately, I suspect I'm the only one who will do much suffering if things are consummated.

i never for one minute believed any of those surveys that say more men then women cheat. or that men have so many more partners in a lifetime.

i am not that damm dumb

and i agree that us females usually, as you say, pull the trigger

and about the co-worker, you are not a playa and it won't be real too long before it is YOU who is not getting what he needs. i've begun to think that there aren't real too many men who are completely satisfied with a sex only relationship. yall want it to be personal just as much as we do.

what yall males call fear us females call good sense. which WAS the judgement...

and how many times do people not look before they leap? or get their hands stuck in the walnut jar (yes i love aesop)

and i'm impressed you are man enough to look at things from many points of view. too many men think it will make them lose their confidence and they just can't never bring their own selves to have the courage to look and learn.

Don't be glad just yet. I said I never hit on a married woman that isn't to say I didn't go out with one. Though technically they were separated and because the marriage was in England the divorce proceedings were a bit of mess. And I'm sure I've done things that some in this thread would consider heinous.

and, by the way, it isn't respecting some other man's property, it is respecting HER decision to marry that man

Okay but what if she isn't respecting her decision?

I'm not advocating you take the Leo approach to finding out if woman are interested. Relationships as we all know are not simplified black and white ordeals. You can't live in absolutes like you can write them. If you meet some woman who makes you heart go a flutter and she is married and by all appearances happy then I say tough move on. But I do not see it as somehow morally wrong or being a "scum sucking opportunist" if you meet a woman you are gaga over, she expresses her own unhappiness in her relationship and you make a move. Would I do it? No and that is because I live by the old steal cliché. If a person will steal for you they will steal on you. So if I am crazy about a woman and I want/hope for a special relationship will I get involved with her to the point where she will cheat on her current boyfriend? No, I won't. Will I look in disgust if somebody else does it? No I won't do that.

And that same positive end result couldn't have happened if the two parties had waited, as Misirlou suggested?

BTW Lassus, I'm happy you are able to view this rationally and see the good that's come out of it. That's a credit to you (and, likely, to your folks), but I don't think it is the only possible response to what happened with your family.

And that same positive end result couldn't have happened if the two parties had waited, as Misirlou suggested?

Waited for what though? I don't think you guys are actually thinking of the real world here when you get on your pedestal and say these things. In the real world people don't like to be alone. In the real world people will stay in a miserable relationship for long periods of time either because they are too chicken to tell other it is quits or because they are afraid to be on their own. In the real world waiting often means you missed your opportunity and you are not getting another one. People just don't behave that way. They don't jsut turn over one day and say they just figured they are not happy and they want it over. To get that stage often times takes many months and in a lot of cases (in terms of marriages) many years. And is that really better? To be in a loveless relationship for 10 years?